Fellowships

I am a cultural anthropologist whose work has focused on the intersection of sexuality, social inequality and critical methodologies in Asian studies. My doctoral thesis is an ethnographic study of the role of class in the subjective production of Hong Kong gay men amid proliferating local queer developments. Anchored in a specific set of postwar economic transformations, my study demonstrates how the cultural meanings of class are informed by Hong Kong’s progressive transition from a colonial entrepôt with little infrastructure to a first-world global city in the timespan of a few decades and, in doing so, articulates the place-specific logics that perpetuate the reproduction of class inequalities in Hong Kong queer culture.

During my fellowship at IIAS, I will expand my doctoral thesis and write a book manuscript that argues for class as a method towards localising queer studies in Hong Kong and other East Asian societies (i.e. Taiwan, Singapore, South Korea) that share similar trajectories of compressed modernisation and class formation.

Field

Country of origin

Hong Kong

Period of stay at IIAS

01/04/2018 to 31/01/2019

Research topic

Local history, queer modernity: Class differences among gay men in Hong Kong

About IIAS

IIAS is a Humanities and Social Sciences research institute and knowledge exchange platform. It encourages the multidisciplinary study of Asia and initiates programmes that engage Asian and other international partners. IIAS facilitates fellowships, organises conferences and publishes The Newsletter, our free periodical on Asian Studies.

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